Festival season comes to an official—and incredible—close each year with Austin City Limits Festival inTexas. For two weekends in October, Austin's Zilker Park is taken over by multiple stages featuring artists spanning a multitude of genres and styles for three days of great music and rich Texas culture.

Japanese Breakfast On The Pressure & Playfulness Behind 'Soft Sounds…'

Michelle Zauner is only beginning to reveal the breadth and depth of her talents. While she composes music for video games, directs music videos and is an accomplished writer, it's her work as Japanese Breakfast that has caught a buzz the past two years. Having released two albums under the moniker, her latest, Soft Sounds From Another Planet, expands the simple beauty and bite of her debut, Psychopomp, into new sonic – and personal – territory. As an emerging artist of many mediums, her work thus far is only the tip of a talent iceberg.

Oct 24, 2018 – 5:54 pm

Japanese Breakfast On 'Soft Sounds…' & "Boyish"

We caught up with Zauner recently to talk about her musical evolution, dissect her song "Boyish," hear what music and art is currently inspiring her, and much more.

How did you arrive musically in the direction of your second record?

Soft Sounds From Another Planet is a super different record from Psychopomp. I wrote my first record for Japanese Breakfast two months after my mom passed away. I didn't have a label, and I didn't have a deadline. I didn't have a band. It was just a therapeutic art project for me to process what I was going through, and kind of compartmentalize what I was feeling. It was just a really great way to focus my time after something really hard had happened. And then after I finished it, I sort of sent it around to labels and no one wanted it, and then it came out on Yellow K Records and people started really paying attention to the project.

Then I signed to Dead Oceans and all-of-a-sudden had a budget, and I had a deadline, and I had a fan base that we had made. And there was a lot more pressure, so I wanted to be really careful how I went about it. I didn't want to lose the kind of playfulness and the experimental quality of Psychopomp, I really wanted to go into the record and just play. And have a childlike, experimental time of making the record.

But I also wanted it to have a way more hi-fi sound. So I reached out to my friend, Craig Hendrix, who plays drums in the live band and he co-produced the album with me, and together we played all of the instruments, and had a very concentrated one month period of time in our studio in Philadelphia. We just wanted to make something that was really dynamic and I also felt for this project, I wanted to go into the studio with the live band being an afterthought. I just wanted to be able to put on whatever kind of instrumentation and build up the songs however I wanted to, without thinking how is it going to translate into a live setting. I feel like you're able to be more ambitious with a project if you approach it that way.

How have you approached translating these songs from the recordings, which are just so vast and nuanced, to a live stage show?

I don't know, I guess it just takes time. You figure out what's important. We use backing tracks on some of the songs, but we have four players. We switch off on guitar and keys a lot, and it's just about figuring out what is the most important part of the song and how to bring it out.

Can you tell us how "Boyish" was written and how it came together in the studio?

"Boyish" was written a long time ago, maybe three or four years ago, and it was originally, I wrote it for my old band, Little Big League, and it kind of turned into this terrible raucous pop punk song. And I just always hated the arrangement, and I always hated the production and I felt like it was a real, a real shame that that's how it happened.

And I feel like the lyrics are great and the chorus just lifts really naturally, And so I asked the band if I could revisit it on our next record and they said, "Go for it." So Craig and I really turned it into this Roy Orbison-esque, girl group, big Motown swelling chorus kind of song. It was really fun to put together. That was one of the most natural, quick to come together songs on the record, and I think the most beautiful collaboration between Craig and I.

And actually, the drum set we recorded were scratch drums, and the vocal that we recorded was a scratch vocal on a [Shure SM]57 with the speakers playing the track back. And when we tried to redo the vocal on a different microphone, a more expensive microphone, and comp it, and rerecord the drums… There was something so special about the one take scratch vocal. And so that sometimes, you need to add all the extra stuff in order to realize what is absolutely essential. And it was maybe one of the first songs on the record that I made where I understood how important the take can be.

I'm generally not a big analog buff and I like cheating. I like to comp stuff and do a million takes and multitrack, so for that, it was a really special moment where it's just like, "there is something really special about that take and no matter what, how many times we redo it, I can't recreate that." So it ended up just being the one vocal take. So that sound is really special to me, for sure.

Your recent article in The New Yorker is an incredible snapshot of how a place can trigger a feeling. How has Korean culture influenced your music.

I guess Korean culture – I don't know – I've always been Korean and written music so I don't really know what it's like to not be like that. I never really thought too much about it, it's just like writing anything else in my life. There are some things on my subconscious that filter their way into it. Like on Psychopomp, there's a voice recording of my mom who's talking to me on phone call, and she says a couple words in Korean, so that's on there. And on the first track of Soft Sounds From Another Planet, there is a song called "Diving Woman" which is written about these women on Jeju Island that are- it's kind of a matriarchal society where they do deep dives without equipment to collect abalone and shellfish, and they sell it at the market.

And I just thought that that occupation was really beautiful, to have that kind of regimen. Because when you're a musician, sometimes, it's really tainted by all this other stuff that you have to do. It's not this pure craft where you just make music and then that's all you do. You have to play a live show, you have to do interviews, you have to take photos, and all this stuff, and sometimes I just really romanticize this lifestyle where these women just dive. All day. And I think that I long for that in my life sometimes.

What inspires you and what are you listening to now? What in either music or other art are you into at the moment?

I am currently working on the soundtrack to an indie game called "Sable." So I've been listening, and also on tour, if I want to read or just have some solace, I really need to listen to ambient, instrumental music. So I've been listening to a lot of Japanese ambient music. Like Haruomi Hosono and Ryuichi Sakamoto. Just because it's the only music that puts me in my chill place. Brian Eno, Nils Frahm, those kinds of [artists].

What's next for you? Can you tease any projects for us?

I'll probably start working on a new record, and I'm working on the soundtrack to the game, I might write a book. I'm directing music videos for a couple of different artists, so just staying busy.

With a new single, a new sound, and a new perspective on love, Sharon Van Etten is evolving before our ears. Her unmistakable voice and melodic prowess earned her a spot on indie folk playlists everywhere with 2014's Are You There. Now, after re-releasing her debut LP last year, she's taken a new tack toward her upcoming album, Remind Me Tomorrow, due out Jan. 18. We linked up with Van Etten backstage at the Austin City Limits Festival to talk about her new single and how her forthcoming album came together.

Roaming backstage at the Austin City Limits Festival, wearing a big cowboy hat and an even bigger smile, Elle King's energy is contagious. It's the same blend of confidence, character and creativity that launched her into the budding star she's become since releasing her 2014 breakout hit "Ex's & Oh's," which earned her two of her three GRAMMY nominations. With a new album, Shake The Spirit, on the way and several sizzling new singles teasing what's next, King is primed for a full-blown gritty pop rock takeover.

Oct 7, 2018 – 2:37 pm

Elle King Talks New Music, Brandi Carlile At ACL

The singer/songwriter sat down with us backstage at ACL to talk about her latest single, recording her new album in Texas, what she loves to do outside of music, and much more.

Your latest single, "Little bit of Lovin'" came out just yesterday. Tell us a little bit about how that song came together.

It's my favorite song with the [new] record. It has like some of the most meaning to me and I wrote it on the first night of recording, actually. I stayed up late, and the guy who runs the studio in Texas, he let me stay up late, and I was really going through a lot. Somehow this song just like came through me, and it was the first song that I really thought about, like, what message I'm putting out into the world? I was really struggling with a lot of things personally. I had no idea or concept of what like self-love was, and for some reason there was just this message that had to come through me.

And I'm really glad that it did. And I had no idea that I could write a song like that… I'd never been like, "Let's write a universal song about self-love and blah, blah, blah." And I just probably would have laughed at an idea, a song like that. But it came through me and it was a beautiful moment and that song made me snap back into my body, you know? It's kind of because of that song, which is how we got the title of the whole record. It's just a special, special thing and I hope that one person can hear that and be like maybe I should think about the way I feel about myself, and I should love myself. So it's an important song, I think.

Speaking of the new album, where were you able to take this project musically that was a new place for you, considering all the success of "Ex's & Oh's" and Love Stuff?

The special thing about "Ex's and Oh's" and Love Stuff was that, it really, it gave me a really magical platform. It gave me some say so on my own ideas, and I had no idea that I would be able to produce something, or make a record and have it be [my vision]. I didn't know that I had any kind of sonic vision at all. And so, I just asked my label, "Just let me make this with my band." And they did. You know, you don't get what you don't ask for right?

And so to go through all of this and have people around me, you know, men surrounding a woman and listening to her ideas and having really great support and not just musically, but emotionally and everything, I made this tangible thing that was such a cathartic process that is so me in every sense of the word. And there was so much freedom in it and it was just a really incredible experience.

You've been such an impactful artist in today's industry and society on issues like gender equality, authenticity and self-love. "Naturally Pretty Girls" is a bold, empowering example of that. How does it feel to have had that impact on music and on culture, all stemming from trying to write a song that mattered to you personally?

I never, ever, set out to be like, "I'm gonna make a difference," and "I'm gonna do something," but I knew that I would be a different type of person. Because there really is only one me. There's only one of every type of person. You know? And that's what's beautiful and we should celebrate individuality in every sense of the word. So I never set out to do anything like that, all I did was wanna play songs and you know, it took a long time for people to listen to me. So I fought louder and I sang louder and played harder, and then this theme came up with like people being like, "I agree with you." And like, I was singing about things, even on the first record and to now, like I sing about things that not a lot of people want to sing about.

When I see people come let loose at my shows, it's a beautiful, beautiful thing. And it's great, and you know people should be able to do that. People should celebrate themselves and their individuality. I don't want to sound like anybody else.

Before the interview, you mentioned you went hiking earlier. What else do you like to do outside of music?

Over the last like year and a half I've really had to find something other than music. Because, you know, music is a hobby, it's my "jobby." [laughs] It's like everything, you know?... But there can come a time in it where like, "Oh well this isn't gonna be a hit," and I don't want to finish writing a song. And there's like all this pressure that I was putting on myself and so I would go out to the desert, and it was very like healing for me. And then I got really into stones and I really like rock hounding. I'm not like a physically fit person, but I like to be out in nature, so I'm really into hiking and looking for rocks. I got a rock in my pocket right now. I found a really cool agate at Pedernales Falls, and I found some really beautiful agate, feel that, it's really soft. It's a healing stone. It's a grounding stone.

“You have to shake yourself. You have to shake yourself out of it.” This record was a crazy, beautiful, enlightening, scary process and I can’t wait for you all to hear it and feel it within you. Excited to announce that Shake the Spirit is out 10.19.18! https://t.co/UdrpHWlr8h

You've traveled and lived all over. What is different about Austin as a music town? And maybe specifically ACL, what sticks out to you?

Well, this is my first time playing ACL, so I don't really know anything about it yet, all I know is that like, like I've never played it in the past, because only the cool people played it in the past. So now I'm like, I'm playing ACL. I feel cool! But I love Austin, my music broke here, and so I owe so much to this town. I think that you have to be cool for Austin to like you. And you have to be [yourself], like keep Austin weird and everything. There's a really big celebration of individuality here, when everything is super, super special. And so, for someone to just show up in Austin, like me, and stick out and have people kind of gravitate towards me, that was a very, very cool thing. And so I've always felt very at home here. And I love Austin to death, I really do.

Recap: Lollapalooza 2018 With The Recording Academy

Lollapalooza arrives year after year at summer's peak to celebrate music with one of the most can't-miss festivals. This year, the Recording Academy was on-the-ground in Grant Park for exclusive interviews and backstage access, bringing you insight from a wide variety of artists. Whether you're a fan of EDM, rock, pop, hip-hop, or R&B, there was something for everyone on this year's lineup, and we were there to capture the action.

Aug 6, 2018 – 11:09 am

Lollapalooza 2018 Recording Academy Recap

The four-day festival featured dozens of acts across eight stages including Kidzapalooa for the parents out there. For more coverage from backstage in Chicago, check out our Lollapalooza 2018 photo gallery.

Some of the content on this site expresses viewpoints and opinions that are not those of the Recording Academy. Responsibility for the accuracy of information provided in stories not written by or specifically prepared for the Academy lies with the story's original source or writer. Content on this site does not reflect an endorsement or recommendation of any artist or music by the Recording Academy.